The great salt battle

Sue Davis

Journal-Advocate columnist

Posted:
06/10/2016 07:02:40 AM MDT

This is just great! After doing my level best (most days) to reduce my sodium/salt intake to acceptable levels, new FDA guidelines have come out which indicate that Americans like me are still consuming too much salt/sodium and need to cut it even more.

Well, I was born a Baby Boomer in a household that believed a clean plate was next to Godliness. A parent's best way to see a child produce a clean plate was to load up the food with good-tasting butter and salt. And, of course, all meals were followed by a reward of dessert "if you clean your plate."

Sometime after I was born, my paternal grandfather suffered a massive stroke that affected his left side. A few years later he had to restrict his salt usage. Before the restriction, though, I recall my grandmother often fixing him two liberally salted sunny-side-up eggs with dry toast and a bowl of canned grapefruit sections.

Sue Davis Journal-Advocate columnist

Grandfather wasn't supposed to eat bacon but Grandmother had found this amazing powdered stuff called Bacon Salt. It was delicious on eggs. I swear it was just finely ground bacon mixed with pulverized salt. It sprinkled out of the shaker in a fine powdery dust that made any egg taste like it had been fried in bacon grease.

Grandfather eventually had to give that up, too, so we got the Bacon Salt shaker. If we'd thought that stuff was good on eggs, it was positively sinful on fresh, hot popcorn.

In the mid-1960s, the FDA apparently decided that Bacon Salt wasn't good for Americans because it suddenly disappeared from grocery shelves. Those who'd used it had to console ourselves with real bacon. Sigh.

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My husband's grandfather loved salt and was one of those few who had no problems with cholesterol, high blood pressure, heart disease or his weight. That's probably a good thing since he used salt in excess. To watch him prepare a hamburger sent my blood pressure to astronomical levels. When he got done "salting" his hamburger, the top of the char-broiled patty was literally white. His son was also heavy-handed with the salt shaker. In fact, my father-in-law told my husband and me, "If my doctor ever tells me that I have to give up salt, you might just as well bury me then and there because I am not giving it up!"

When I think of the times my friends and I would break off chunks of salt from a block of salt in a cow pasture then wash it at the pump so we could lick it all afternoon, I almost shudder. If we got thirsty from all the salt we'd consumed, we just went to someone's house to get a good swig of water from the hose.

Because I had a water retention problem with my first pregnancy, I did cut back on my salt and wish I'd continued that practice after my baby was born. But the concern no longer existed so I used salt freely when cooking and eating. The years crept up on me as did the numbers on my doctor's sphygmomanometer (blood pressure monitor). Meds help control the numbers as does exercise but eliminating more salt would help too.

It's hard to eat less salt when one is 65 and has spent an entire life using it as a flavor enhancer. It's like I'm addicted to something that was OK for a lifetime but it's poison now. I'm making an effort to reduce my sodium intake but not without a fight.

I am willing to cut back my salt usage, except I have to have it on eggs, on chicken or turkey, all fish, most cooked veggies and, of course, popcorn.

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